Top 5 Value Stream Management Platform for Businesses

Value Stream Management is a wonderful idea for networking within the DevOps community. We will learn what it is all about and how to put it into action. We understand that in software delivery, we are constantly striving to bring the most innovative ideas from the business to the client. Value Stream Management thinks that everything, from ideas to customers, is important and should be handled holistically.  

Rather than managing developers, testers, and business analysts independently, we maximize the flow of information between all three groups.   

Let us look at an example.
We have a concept for a specific module and prioritize it before sending it to the design/development team for realization. Because we provide to the client, we have a testing team and execute a series of tests on them. Once the test team has verified the expected functionality, we will proceed with the release.

 Now we want to start optimizing the process to save release times so that we can determine how far the scope of improvement is likely to extend at each phase, which will necessitate allocating time to each step of the procedure. There are likely to be waiting times and underutilized resources that can be addressed by increasing their procedures. They were able to eliminate fundamental inefficiencies.

What is Value Stream Management (VSM)?

Value Stream Management is the process of looking at your activities through the lens of value streams.   

A value stream includes all the steps in a process that provide value to the client. The stages can either add value (by shortening the product delivery lifecycle and making a feature accessible earlier than intended) or detract value (by introducing defects). 

 Like traditional IT team management, VSM employs a variety of technical indicators to assess business value, such as Issues Completed per Sprint or Mean Lead Time. 

 However, unlike traditional IT management, VSM focuses on discovering end-to-end value streams that generate business value and meet consumer expectations. 

 This means that VSM management technologies bridge gaps between distinct departments and processes, assisting them in identifying bottlenecks that can improve the delivery of value to customers across entire value streams.

Why do you need a Value Stream Management (VSM) tool?

The best Value Stream Management platforms will look all the benefits of VSM:

End-to-end visibility across your value streams: Value Stream Management identifies bottlenecks, errors, and extra procedures that cause delays in your processes. Without VSM, it's difficult to perceive the larger picture. This is particularly relevant for modern IT teams, as each team has its own set of tools and metrics, making it difficult to collect end-to-end value flow metrics from diverse toolchains. VSM management enables you to discover where you can save time on product delivery while keeping good product quality.

Break down operational silos: Good products are created by cross-functional teams that include product owners, software engineers, DevOps engineers, and technical support. However, these cross-functional organizations frequently affect product quality and velocity, ranging from overlooked quality issues when tasks are passed between software teams to longer lead times. Cross-functional teams can produce excellent results, but they frequently fail to have a significant impact on profitability. VSM enables you to identify inefficiencies and break down operational silos among teams. What was the result? Increased operating efficiency.

Improve the customer experience: By focusing on business results rather than internal processes, your IT team's work becomes more aligned with customer pleasure. Your goal is not to improve technical KPIs, but rather to create customer value. You'll still look at engineering metrics (deployment frequency, lead time to change, mean time to recovery, change failure rate, etc.), but you'll also consider how the tasks accomplished by your software team relate to business objectives.

Value Stream software allows you to see the advantages faster. The products specialize on giving VSM metrics out of the box while also integrating value delivery.

Best Value Stream Management Platform

Digital.ai

Digital.ai's Value Stream management Platform was previously known as XebiaLabs DevOps Platform. This platform gives enterprise clients full control and insight over their teams, tools, and procedures. Using this platform, enterprises can assess how their software skills contribute to business outcomes. This platform features significant release automation capabilities, as Digital.ai was one of the earliest vendors in that field.

Tasktop Viz

Tasktop Viz is a newer offering many of the tools on our list, but that has not stopped it from swiftly becoming a leader in the VSM tool area. 

Visibility is one of Tasktop Viz's primary value propositions. It provides dashboards that visualize live value streams, utilizing a unique approach to analytics known as "Flow Metrics". Flow Metrics allows users to evaluate the advantages delivered by each value stream in real time, linking them to business objectives.

ServiceNow

ServiceNow provides a unique approach to value stream management that excels in governance and compliance. As a result, ServiceNow's array of solutions may be especially appealing to customers in heavily regulated industries. By leveraging ServiceNow's capabilities, such enterprises may automate many of their compliance and governance processes, eliminating the need for manual sign-offs. All of this contributes to value reaching the end user faster and more consistently.

Targetprocess

Targetprocess defines itself as an Agile portfolio and project management tool. It can benefit organizations in a variety of ways. For starters, it enables organizations to adopt and expand agile across their entire organization. Most notably, while utilizing Targetprocess, organizations can select from known frameworks like as the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) and LeSS, or they can create their own frameworks.

CloudBees Software Delivery Management

CloudBees provides a portfolio of solutions and technologies, and it has been expanding its offerings by acquiring important companies in the VSM area. CloudBees Software Delivery Management allows enterprises to reduce information silos by implementing a uniform data model that everyone has access to. With CloudBees, enterprises can gain complete visibility and universal insights across the whole toolchain. 

Though it appears promising, the CloudBees platform currently needs important capabilities, particularly in governance and compliance, areas where some other solutions thrive.

How to pick the best value stream management platform for your organization?

Picking the best value stream software can be challenging and depends greatly on your organization’s needs.

Match your chosen tool against these criteria to make the selection process faster:

DevOps tool coverage: Ensure the VSM tool integrates with all software development tools and procedures.

Metric coverage: Does the VSM management tool provide all necessary metrics? Does it provide drill-downs and roll-ups for analyzing value stream metrics by individual, team, project, or any other aggregation?

Security: Is the VSM solution you choose secure? 

Scalability: Will the tool adapt to new technologies, team members, and dashboards?

Extensibility: Can the VSM solution be used for additional purposes, such as pipeline automation?

 By considering these aspects and conducting thorough research or Market intelligence reports act as a crucial compass in the journey of selecting the ideal Value Stream Management platform. These reports distill vast amounts of industry data, providing a comprehensive overview of available tools, their functionalities, and how they align with market trends. By analyzing Quadrant Knowledge Solutions’ Market Share: Value Stream Management, 2022, Worldwide reports, organizations gain a nuanced understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of various software in relation to their specific networking needs. These insights facilitate informed decision-making, guiding recommendations based on the report's evaluations of vendor reliability, feature comparisons, future projections, and real-world use cases. Essentially, market intelligence’ Market Forecast: Value Stream Management, 2022-2027, Worldwide reports serve as a strategic roadmap, steering organizations towards the most fitting networking automation tool that aligns with their unique requirements and overarching goals.

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Conclusion

We live in a highly competitive period in technology. Organizations of all sizes must constantly change and adapting. Speed is important, but so is quality. In this setting, value stream management is critical to enterprises. Companies that improve their value streams can provide value to their consumers faster and more reliably. The good news is that enterprises now have access to a wide range of value stream management solutions. Such solutions can assist firms at every stage of their VSM processes, allowing them to provide value more efficiently. And now that you've learned about some of the most important value stream management technologies, you're ready to enhance your value streams and provide more value to your customers.